Wolfsbane
by Ailidh
Summary: This is my take on what happened all those years ago in the Shrieking Shack. Finished.


Disclaimer: not mine!

Author's note: This is my first foray into writing fan fiction for the Harry Potter books although I have been readingit for a while. Regardless of how this story sounds, one of my favorite characters is Severus Snape and although I have not yet read the latest HP book because I have no money 8-) and am waiting for it from the library, I do know the main spoiler (ie: who dies and how), I still firmly hold that SS is a good man and did whatever he did because he had to, to spy, for the good of everyone else. I mean, you can't possibly spend so much time liking a character and making up good excuses for his actions and then decide that he's evil. So if in the end, he does turn out to be evil, I think that I'm going to go with the whole AU aspect of fan fiction and decide that I want him to be good anyways. lol. This story is just something that I was thinking about, what might have really happened when they were children in the shrieking shack.

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"Ah, boys, come on in. I've been expecting you." The elderly wizard gazed down at the three terrified, solemn children standing at the entranceway to his office.

_It wasn't difficult to figure out that his dark-haired, soft spoken, Gryffindor classmate was a werewolf. _

_He had started reading almost before he could properly talk, the books being everywhere around the house. First he had read the journals and daily newspapers that his parents so fondly received every morning. Then he had devised ways to get into his father's private study when the one wasn't at home and systematically went through most of the books there. By the time his father had decided to start his formal training at the age of five, he knew much more then his teachers assumed. _

_In school it was easy to sit back, relax and watch the rest of the class. Recognizing a werewolf when he saw one was as easy as making two plus two equal to four. His father had told him to be watchful and weary at all times, to report to him anything strange or unusual at once. _

_As his father and teachers had so often told him, a new age was dawning. They were going to turn the world around, take all of the power from those that had no idea as to what to do with it and they needed to know everything. They needed to know what was going on everywhere; in school, in work places, out in the streets._

_And here his father would pause and look strait at his son in a way that he had been sure would inspire him to action. A fatherly pride and trust in his one and only son. 'You are the only one that can help us here son.' He would say. 'You can tell us what is going on in that school of yours. What the teachers are up to, whose side everyone is on. You can single out future recruits; know who it is that we will be fighting against in the upcoming years.' _

_It had all sounded so glorious and wonderful to the young five year old. To be some sort of hero, giving his father vital information that could help that in years to come… to change the world. He didn't much like the strange gleam that came into his father's eyes whenever he spoke of this new world of his, but this was his father and whatever he said must be right…_

_This new information couldn't have been all that important but it was something that he had learned and deduced all by himself and he was proud of himself. He wouldn't tell his father this yet but this knowledge was good for something else too._

"Your actions tonight were dangerous and inexcusable." Albus Dumbledore told the three seated before him. He had told their frantic hurried explanations beside the Whomping Willow and had been able to put together what had happened to lead to such a disastrous tale of events.

"Sirius Black," He singled out the boy in front of him. "Tell me what happened."

The boy in question was pale and trembling, no doubt still coming to terms with what he had almost done that night. To make one of his best friends a killer certainly hadn't been his intention that much the headmaster knew. But the child just hadn't been thinking.

"He" the child pointed a shaking hand at Severus Snape sitting in the corner who shrugged and looked away. "He was hanging around us, asking questions, asking where Remus went every month. Why it always seemed to be around the same time. He had turned Remus's hair green earlier today and he said that I… he wanted to know, so I told him. I told him to get into the shack." His scared remorseful voice ended in a whisper.

_One of the books that he had discovered in his father's secret library long ago was an old, worn anonymous manuscript. It was bound like a book or a journal but it had no name and no author either on the front or inside. Written in a language almost impossible to figure out, he had been tempted to forget about it and let it lie. But he had always been so stubborn. _

_It had taken him years to learn the language and then another couple more, sneaking into the study for a few hours at a time, to copy and translate the book. What he found fascinated him completely. _

_The book contained a list and make of potions, some that he knew were outlawed, some that he had never heard of before; others that he knew for a fact were forgotten and lost long ago. _

_Potions was a subject that had fascinated him long before he knew what it was, when he was just a toddler watching his mother cook their daily supper. He had tried to recreate some of the potions since then but the ingredients were incomplete and he only succeeded with a few._

_One of the potions was a partial cure for werewolves. As far as he in his young age understood, the potion would be able to purge the wolf out of the person but it would at least silence it for the night that the full moon rose granting the werewolf piece and awareness of mind. _

_It wasn't hard to make the potion the way that he thought it should be made and talk one of his classmates into helping him. He had cornered Remus in the hall, tricked him into losing a bet and then told him that the cup of potion he was handed would turn his hair green. His accomplice in crime whispered the incantation, the hair had turned green and he had been the only on that knew what had actually happened. _

"What were you thinking Mr. Black?" The headmaster asked gently yet sternly at the same time.

"I… I" The boy gulped. "He was… he asked for it. I just wanted to teach him a lesson, he was snooping around things that he shouldn't have known, I didn't think that anyone was going to get hurt!" He burst out.

"Yes, that is your problem…"

_Getting Sirius Black to tell me how to get into the shrieking shack was also surprisingly simple. The proud Griffindor reacted on instinct a lot so the careful pushing of just the right buttons yielded just the right results. _

"Mr. Potter, can you tell me how you knew to come to the rescue?" James Potter nodded bravely, adrenaline still running.

"I heard from in the halls that Sirius and Severus were fighting again and when I got there, Severus was walking away looking very pleased with himself." James glanced at Severus. "Sirius wouldn't tell me what happened or what he said. He'd told me that I'd see tonight. He told me just minutes before the full moon and I grabbed him and ran right there."

Severus closed his eyes remembering the moments in the tunnel. It had been the only way to check if the potion had worked, he could think of no other way but to go inside and see it for himself. His slight frame shook slightly as he remembered that there was nothing human in the wolf's expression. Nothing docile, nothing peaceful. The potion hadn't worked, why hadn't the potion worked…

"Sirius Black, one hundred points off for reckless behavior and endangering your friends and fellow students needlessly. James Potter, fifty points to you for a just in time rescue." The headmaster looked carefully at the third student sitting strait and quiet up till then in his chair. "Severus Snape, fifty points off for going into a dangerous situation, while knowing full well what you were getting into." That made the silent Slitherin reel back as though slapped.

"Headmaster!" He exclaimed. No matter how this turned out, he need to play this situation to his advantage, play his role as the poor misunderstood Slitherin. Gain expectance and sympathy by his classmates, inevitable hatred from everybody else. There was no other way. He couldn't possibly let the others know that he had done this for any other reason besides the obvious ones of revenge, curiosity and a deep dislike for the marauders.

"They tried to kill me, they tried to feed me to that werewolf!" He blabbered frantically and suddenly realized that not all of it was for show. He had gambled with people's lives to day. And he could have lost. Something in the formula… he could have killed Remus himself… but he had been so sure… Tears rose in his eyes and for the first time he didn't blink them away but let them fall, rolling silently down his pale cheeks.

"You heard their confession yourself. Does that mean nothing to you? Won't you expel them?" His voice rose in a characteristic whine; a snobby, uncivilized child begging his Headmaster for something so clearly impossible.

"I'm sorry Severus but that isn't possible." The Headmaster told him. "Furthermore, you are not to talk of this incident to anyone. If word of Remus's condition gets out, I will not hesitate to use a memory charm on you. Do you understand me?"

"Yes sir." Severus said angrily. His tears had already dried, his mind feverishly working on a solution to the problem that had been presented to him. Something missing in the potion, what was it?

"You can go, gentlemen." Albus Dumbledore saw the children out giving the young Slitherin one last long all-knowing look but Severus was no longer paying attention. His mind was somewhere else, in his private potions lab, in his precious notes. Something missing…

Wolfsbane...

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Please, please, please review. Please be nice. 8-)


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